Five years ago, the headline below would have scared me. Today it makes me take pause and look for supportive data and additional information. What a fundamental change that is indeed. (Full article associated with this headline here)

One of the first things I ran across when googling ‘splenda leukemia’ was this Op Ed from Forbes. Oh isn’t this interesting? The institute from which the study came is known for sketchy science practices.

(I half expected to find the ever-infamous Seralini’s name mentioned somewhere in the text. Remember him? He designed a study using rats prone to tumors, fed them GMOs and then produced so-called data showing that the GMOs caused the tumors. This study was a joke to the science world – published, retracted, republished – and a lot of people believed it and still do. The pictures of those poor, lumpy rats provided the emotional hook.

Giles Seralini with one of his sad, little rats.

Why Be Transparent When You Can Be Theatrical?

Forbes Contributor Trevor Butterworth writes:

Normally, when academics find something that might be of deep concern to public health, they submit their research to peer-reviewed scientific publications, which then fast-track the findings online if, that is, their academic reviewers find the study rigorous enough for publication. Moreover, these publications also send out an embargoed copy of the paper to journalists, along with a press release. In theory, this gives time for journalists to read through the paper, examine the data, and formulate questions for the authors of the research or other outside experts.

But why be transparent when you can be theatrical? In a move that bypasses good but boring scientific practice and goes straight for the klieg lights and the razzle dazzle of the media, Dr Morando Soffritti, Director of the Ramazzini Institute in Bologna, Italy offers only a press release saying that he found mice were at increased risk for cancer after being fed Splenda, the popular non-calorie sweetener.

Later, Butterworth adds (emphasis mine):

He (Soffriti) plans on telling the world more about this alarming finding, which disagrees with everything else we know about Splenda and sucralose, at a conference on childhood cancer in London tomorrow (Wednesday 25th), organized by Children with Cancer UK.

Ok, so this article alone makes me become very skeptical indeed about this study linking leukemia to Splenda, or sucralose, the generic name of the substance. I now wonder, well what does the actual data say? From here I try to find evidence-based articles where I can hopefully find links to actual peer-reviewed research. To find the actual studies with a few simple clicks proves difficult but I make a vow to dig in deeper later. Sticking with the Forbes piece I go on to read:

The problem hanging over the Splenda finding is that which hangs over the Ramazzini Institute in general: Quality control. No matter what substance the Institute tests for cancer, the results always seem to be positive, whereas other laboratories testing the same substances repeatedly fail to come up with the same findings.

Then I go on to read:

Take aspartame, which the Ramazzini Institute declared carcinogenic in a study it conducted in 2005 and multiple studies thereafter. The European Union’s Food Safety Authority commissioned a panel of experts to examine this study as a matter of high priority, given its alarming findings; its conclusions, however, were devastating. It appeared that many of the rats were sick with chronic lung respiratory disease, which just so happens to cause the same kinds of cancer that Ramazzini attributed to aspartame.

That sounds alarmingly like what Seralini did!

Suffice it to say, this study has been extensively and internationally criticized by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the UK’s Department of Health Committee on the Carcinogenicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment (COC), the French Food Safety Agency (AFSSA/ANSES), and the New Zealand Food Safety Authory (NZFSA) and others. Quite an impressive – and for me, convincing – list.

I smell a rat!

One would assume that a research institute that wanted to be taken seriously would be concerned that so much criticism was coming it’s way. Apparently that is not the case. Butterworth writes:

The pattern was, tell the media about the cancer warning first, inflame public and political opinion, then stonewall the agencies on the data later. None of the studies were ever published in a leading, peer-reviewed cancer journal.

I still haven’t been able to get to the actual peer-reviewed studies initially done on sucralose. But that doesn’t mean I’m giving up. It is on my to-do list. The bottom line of what I’m trying to express is that we as consumers have to perform our due diligence if we want the actual facts. The science may in future show that sucralose is dangerous. But it hasn’t yet. That is what I know so far.

Here are some dos and don’ts that I follow:

Don’t just blindly believe any old headline you see. As I encounter headlines that are in line with what I may already believe only because I’ve heard something here or there, I am extra skeptical. I must remember at all times that beliefs are NOT facts. I must dig in my heels and do some research.

Don’t accept the first several click results from google as being the end-all, be-all of information.

Do place a red flag in my mind next to emotional appeals, sensationalized headlines, dramatic statements, photographs and memes. Find out more. Look for evidence-based information but be aware that a lot of websites disguise data as being science based when it is not at all. Always be on the lookout for trustworthy sources. Research can be difficult to understand if you haven’t studied the sciences in grad school. Find an expert to help you!

I have been wanting to post about this topic for awhile. It’s a bit of a rant but there is also a rave or two. Read on.

As I watch the perpetually ongoing merry-go-round of health activism with all its blame for obesity and disease going to culprits like GMOs, vaccines, this or that chemical, etc. – I am constantly reminded of this:

There are other countries in which the people are simply not obese, or even overweight. They eat the same GMOs we do – corn and cotton seed oils, canola, etc. Many get the same vaccines we do. They’re not diseased and fat. Or at least they don’t get the same obesity related diseases we do.

Last year I spent several weeks in southeast Asia, namely Thailand, Myanmar (Burma), and Cambodia. What was starkly obvious to me is that the further away from an American-type diet the populations got, the skinnier and more healthful looking the people were. I’m not talking poverty-skinny. I’m talking really gorgeous skinny.

Similarly, very recently I spent time on a Dutch Caribbean Island (Bonaire) and noticed that the supermarkets didn’t have entire aisles loaded with snacky stuff like potato chips and cheetos. Even on this remote island, cheeses and other dairy products were of much higher quality. I remember noticing the exact same thing decades ago when I spent six weeks in Germany. Markets devoted about a section or two of stacked shelving to potato chips and other junk – instead of the whole damn aisle. (On a side note, if you didn’t bring a bag, you didn’t get a bag. No one complained. It can be done. Whole other topic -sorry.)

The Beautiful People

Getting specific now, in Myanmar for example, no one was even fat let alone obese. The worst I saw was maybe slightly pudgy. The truth is I never saw more stunningly beautiful, slender, smartly dressed people in all my life! What do they eat? For one thing, lots and lots of fresh produce. Want a quick snack from a street vendor? Look any direction and you’ll find beautifully cut watermelon, mango or other sumptuous fruit. I can’t even think of one street vendor in America where I’ve ever seen sliced up watermelon for sale. When you’ve been tromping around doing touristy things under the hot Burmese sun and you see that watermelon all cut up nice on a little plate, it is a most refreshing purchase, and cheap too.

Fruit stands like this are easily found and inexpensive!

The same thing was true in Cambodia. Beautiful, slender people. Want some fast food? Fast food in Cambodia meant a vendor stir frying fresh vegetables with noodles, egg, meat or fish over a gas-heated wok. You stand there for about a minute, two tops, and you get a steaming plate or bowl of healthy made-to-order whole foods. Again, cheap. And did I mention delicious?

The best street food I had was in Battambang, Cambodia one night when my traveling partner and I arrived in town absolutely exhausted and starving. Here in the states we would have gone through the late-night drive through, right? Or maybe gone into a 7-11 for a bag of chips or cookies and maybe a dry sandwich boasting mystery meat and a leaf of wilted lettuce. Well in Cambodia you go to the late-night food stands. We went up to one such stand, pointed at some things on a poster not really knowing what we’d get and for two dollars, received an overloaded, large clam shell container that we couldn’t even close it was so jam packed. With what you wonder? Steaming broccoli, egg, chicken, bamboo shoots, mushrooms and other similar vegetables – all seasoned to perfection. Welcome to Cambodia.

Thailand was more of a mix of the American diet and local faire, especially in the big cities. In Bangkok I did see a lot of overweight Thais, though not any morbidly obese ones like one sees around every corner here in the States. But there was also plenty of delicious and healthy food to be found everywhere and once you get out of tourist areas, the diet is just as it is in Myanmar and Cambodia. Interestingly enough, what we think of as Thai food is almost exactly the same as what they eat in Cambodia and Myanmar – from my point of view anyway. I’m sure there are variations and a local would balk at what I just said, but that’s the way it seemed to me.

Just today I ran across this article from the LA Times Science & Medicine page about the uber high percentage of ‘ultra-processed’ food we Americans eat and it is no surprise to me. Just look at us. As a people, we’re fat and unhealthy. You really see it when you’ve been traveling in other countries and return.